Machines, systems and methods for recognizing visual change in a graphical user interface (GUI) environment, the method comprising determining position of an active GUI object in the GUI environment based on known attributes of the active GUI object; monitoring a focus area in the active GUI object to detect visual changes in attributes of the focus area, without regard to any visual changes outside the focus area; determining whether the active GUI object has moved or has been resized, in response to determining a visual change in the attributes of the focus area; and determining position of a new active GUI object in the GUI environment, in response to determining that the active GUI object has not been moved or has not been resized.